The opportunity of Mobile Apps in the Retail Business

The penetration rate of mobile and internet in the modern era has increased exponentially. It’s been evident that everything has a mobile version these days. And the notion applies to retailers more than for anybody else. The mobile revolution has completely altered the way retailers can interact with their customers. There is no need anymore to rely on billboards or printed materials to advertise discounts and special offers when you can do it more efficiently through apps. Retail mobile apps are opening new avenues for customers across globe.

Ever since online shopping boomed several years ago, the retail industry has been utilizing technologies and innovations to attract consumers to the e-commerce market and keep them as loyal patrons and brand advocates. There is no doubt about the fact that modern customers heavily depend on the online shop for meeting their slightest demands. The good thing here is, with the advent of the internet and other technological advancements, retailers have shifted to online interfaces to conduct their businesses and have created applications to make their presence felt in the virtual space. Australia has become one of the most lucrative markets for retailers to perform their activities through mobile apps. E-commerce in Australia is growing rapidly, with the online spend reaching 10% of total retail sales in 2018, taking its share to two percentage points higher than the previous year. Australians spend around $27.5 billion buying goods online, an increase of 24.4% year on year. Let us look at the top apps that are great to have for your retail store in Australia.

Shopify

A point of sale (POS) software, Shopify is a real estate mobile app that enables you to sell your products and accept payments through a wide range of e-commerce solutions. Through Shopify, you could create your online store, customize how your storefront looks and works, and also helps in product inventory as well.

Smile.io

Customer retention is as crucial as attracting new customers. So as a retailer, you might want to step-up your loyalty rewards and referral programs. Smile.io is a well-known retail mobile app that makes it easy for you to award points, discounts, and other freebies to your customers. You could use Smile.io to keep track of someone’s birthday and send him or her a gift card to be redeemed at your retail store.

Go, people

Every day there is a lot of merchant-buyer interaction that’s happening online. As a result, customers are able to compare which retailer has the best shipping service that they could rely on. Go People is a courier service in Australia that offers a cheaper, faster, and smarter way of handling your deliveries through an intuitive and responsible platform. It isn’t your typical e-commerce based retail mobile app but definitely forms an important part of the value chain. By using Go People’s service, you have no reason to worry about your customers waiting for too long to receive delicate items like flowers and other perishable goods.

Deputy

Deputy is another scheduling solution that falls in the category of retail mobile apps. It could be specially handy for when you need to make adjustments across shifts. As an added feature, Deputy also allows you to manage other employee related tasks, such as leave approvals and checking of time sheets. Deputy comes in specially crucial when it comes to managing large retail stores which remain open 24*7.

Xero

Xero is a secure web-based accounting retail mobile app that lets you access your financial information from the cloud on any of your registered devices, which makes it the perfect tool to use when you want to see your real-time cash flow anywhere you are. It is also helpful in planning budgets for bills, staff salaries, and purchase orders with your suppliers.

Benefits and Opportunities  of mobile apps in e-commerce

Loyal Audience.

Retail mobile apps bring the customer closer to the brand and thereby help in creating a brand value. According to data provided by Adobe, 67% of online shoppers use their mobile devices for purchases through applications provided by their favorite companies and brand. Customer behavior is essentially directed towards easily accessible avenues, which make their shopping experience comfortable. Retail commerce app can provide such an experience and thus elevate the sales figures. It is also a task to encourage people to download and install the app, which can be done through exclusive offers, limited discounts, etc. at the time of installation. 

Enhanced Usability

Mobile solutions offer the absence of necessity to have access to the internet for applications to work properly. It allows apps to load heavy animations or high definition images fast, making the e-commerce apps aesthetically pleasing with a stylish look, modern and bright. Another added advantage for e-commerce sites to develop retail mobile apps is the gamification implication implementation. Gamification is quite a trend in app development as it provides for more polished and demurred interactivity and engagement on the part of the users.

Shoppers Preference

Retail mobile apps are superior to browsers; in the current pretext.78% of users surveyed claimed they would rather use a mobile app than accessing a store via a mobile browser. With the dynamic antics and fast-changing lifestyles, people want things quick and easy, which can suffice their demand and provide for an easy and productive shopping experience. This aspect is not surprising, though. These apps are much more convenient to use while shopping, especially if you are not making a one-off visit to an online store.  Better security and speed, as opposed to a mobile browser, is also another cherry on the cake for the preference quotient.

Enhanced Ux

In today’s world, presentation is the key to achieving the epitome of success. No matter how amazing your company is and the best products you sell, the way your store is presented to your customer can make or break your sales. Retail mobile apps facilitate easy navigation procedures so that customers can find what they need without much hassle. Also, they are relatively restricting in terms of layout, which cancels out irrelevant buttons or unwanted ads that disrupt the shopping experience by distracting the customers. With precise and simple designs, filters being listed discretely and accessibility can make your store a coveted one for the customers. 

Increased Conversion Rates

The combination of satisfying UX, simple navigation and usability leads to a higher conversion rate. Retail mobile apps persuade the customers to make the purchase, at a much higher rate, as compared to website browser or desktop. It is as high as three-time than the website and one and half times the desktop. Additionally, customers who access the store through the application is 4.6 times as many products as they would in their mobile browsers owing to optimized item display. So it is a big win-win situation here. 

Higher average order value 

Statistics have shown that mobile shopping apps generate 140% more revenue than mobile sites and 130% more than desktop sites. The reason for this is many, including higher engaging content and display, coupled with lower shopping cart abandonment rates. The simplicity of the mobile commerce application layout makes checkout easier and also enhanced return policy, which doesn’t make people reluctant to buy from your store.

Easy Payment

Gone are the days when you needed to carry a wallet full of cash to buy your favorite jacket or a packet of chips. Retail mobile apps allow their customer to choose among various payment methods, which in turn induces purchase. They also provide EMI options, and customers don’t flinch while purchasing expensive durable goods. This, in turn, increases the sales figures and helps in generating revenues for the company. Also, keeping in check, the security of data and personal information, makes online payment mobile apps a viable option. They also eliminate the redundant procedure of entering information in every step, which in turn discourages any buyer from making purchases. 

Productivity improvement and cost reduction

Retail mobile apps help the stores to expand their audience reach in a very short time by reducing marketing. This proves to be the biggest benefit. They tend to increase productivity by 20% to 40% with readily available charts and reporting tools with accumulated customer data. With direct communication with the clients, the advertisement and marketing costs are reduced drastically. Also, the user of the app can extend the social footprint of the brand on the internet, free of cost. 

Speed

It is an undeniable fact that apps are faster than mobile websites. It is said that they perform actions as fast as 1.5 times than the mobile website. Data retrieval happens in the blink of an eye, and that becomes very intriguing for the customers. Also, mobile sites use java scripts to run functions and apps run on frameworks, which can be five times faster. As all of these happen at the back end, users get to act much faster in the front end, thus rejoicing over a seamless shopping experience. 

Competitive Advantage

In today’s digital age, having a retail mobile app for a retailer renders to have a huge competitive advantage and an added selling proposition. Without it, the e-commerce site is at a huge disadvantage. Customers would rather shop from mobile apps or not buy anything at all. If a customer is indecisive between a shopping website or an online shopping application, he/she will choose the latter. So it is a huge competitive advantage and can be proven to be an incredible business strategy to reap the benefits of the industrial proceeds.

Conclusion

In this blog on retail mobile apps, we have tried to list out all the important aspects in as much detail as possible. Needless to say that with the world going mobile and the international boundaries diminishing as well, it makes absolute sense to have a retail mobile app. Every other day, you see ads about someone or the other who is trying to sell or rent a product to you. It isn’t unusual to be lost in this crowd. However, with a dedicated retail mobile app for your business, you can break the clutter and go truly local as well as global.

Also, it is important that you have the app made from a reliable vendor only. There are n-number of security concerns that need to be addressed, the app planning needs to be done well, the best practices need to be followed, the platform for creation needs to be decided. While all this looks like things that can be done in silos, the case isn’t so and hence one needs to be really thorough with the approach. At Vibeosys, we follow the best practices in app development.

About time we got in touch!